Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird
"Thirteen Ways Of Looking At A Blackbird" is a poem from Wallace Stevens' first book of poetry, Harmonium. It was first published in the literary magazine Others: A Magazine of the New Verse in December 1917, so it is in the public domain.The Complete Public Domain Poems of Wallace Stevens, Volume 1, Librivox Forums. Web, Nov. 1, 2012.Buttel, p. 206. Commentary "Thirteen Ways..." consists of thirteen short, separate poems, all of which mention blackbirds in some way. Although inspired by haiku, none of the segments is actually a haiku. It may be interpreted as one of Stevens's exercises in perspectivism, and accordingly may be compared to such poems as The Snow Man. The perspectives that matter for Stevens issue from the poet's imagination, which, somewhat in the spirit of philosophical nominalism, can unify the world in various ways—for example, as a man and a woman, or a man and a woman and a blackbird (stanza IV). The artist's perspective may be shaped by what he attends to, as for instance on inflections or innuendoes—the blackbird whistling, or just after (stanza V). The poem's haiku-like austerity is striking. Affinities to imagism and cubism are evident. Buttel proposes that the title "alludes humorously to the Cubists' practice of incorporating into unity and stasis a number of possible views of the subject observed over a span of time."Buttel, p. 165 Sight is the dominant perceptual modality. The poems are almost cinematic, as though, in the first poem, a camera focused on a mountain panorama and then zoomed in to the blackbird and its roaming eye. There is reason to classify it as among the metaphysical poems in Harmonium, because it creates an aura of mystery and intimates ineffable knowledge, perhaps conveying the message that 'death comes to all that lives.' But there are also grounds for classifying it as among the book's sensualist poems. "This group of poems is not meant to be a collection of epigrams or of ideas," Stevens remarks in one of his letters, "but of sensations."Stevens, H. p. 252 (See the main Harmonium essay, the section "A flavorously original poetic personality," for the critic Joseph Fletcher's contrast between Stevens's metaphysical and sensuous poems.) Recognition The poem has been the inspiration for at least four pieces of music: "Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird", by Lukas Foss, Thirteen Ways, by Thomas Albert;[http://www.eighthblackbird.com/thirteen_ways Thirteen Ways], "Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird," by Louise Talma for Tenor/Soprano, Oboe/Flute, and Piano"Louise Talma: Compositions", and Blackbirds, for Flute and Bassoon, Gregory Youtz.[http://www.editionsviento.com/getprod.php?prodid=199 Blackbirds, for Flute and Bassoon] See also References * Buttel, Robert. Wallace Stevens: The Making of Harmonium. 1967: Princeton University Press. * Sharpe, Tony. Wallace Stevens: A Literary Life. 2000: Macmillan Press. * Stevens, H. Letters of Wallace Stevens. 1966: University of California Press Notes External links ;Art * Ethan Georgi's drawings http://ethandraws.blogspot.com/search?q=blackbird * Edward Picot's animated illustrations http://www.edwardpicot.com/thirteenways/ ;Audio / video * Librivox: Collected Public Domain Poems of Wallace Stevens, Volume 1. Free. Category:Poetry by Wallace Stevens Category:Text of poem